a place for me to write: loosely related and at least partially unintelligible musings

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Oh, North Dakota

Ever since I can remember, I thought, North Dakota is not for me. I want to be in the big city. Chicago. Yeah, Chicago sounds big.

When I wanted to go to college out-of-state, that wasn’t really going to happen. Too expensive. And being from North Dakota, I stayed in the favor of saving some bucks.

I desperately wanted to live on the California coast, still kinda do. But no, the economy isn’t too great out there, blah blah blah. I stay.

Well, here I am, 27, still living here in North Dakota. I have lots of friends and family in the city I grew up in, Bismarck. But, currently, I live in Grand Forks. I’m getting some experience as an English teacher and I just started an LMIS Master’s program.

I still say I want to go. And maybe I will. I joke that our bumper stickers should read, “North Dakota: Why the hell do we live here?” If you have ever spent more than two weeks in negative sixty with windchill, you’ll understand.

People who aren’t from the plains don’t get the beauty. “There aren’t any trees,” they’ll say. “It’s so flat!” (Yes, the eastern part of the state is incredibly flat. The poor children sled down the man-made dyke.) But, as you venture westward, you’ll see rolling hills. And the lone tree, so symbolic in itself, is a hauntingly beautiful sight.

The haunting beauty. You can almost feel our ancestors in the presence of a great wind. I get lost imagining just how the homesteaders made it through their first winters and summers, equally oppressive, here on the plains. I imagine the native people and how they withstood the blizzards and thunderstorms for so many years.

The grasses come in the colors of the rainbow, subtly. Waving like a million hands that collectively make up the sea of amber with dashes of burgundy. Little splashes of deep green. In the distance, a hazy blue. Little yellow flowers and champagne colored straw. You may have to look for it, but it is there.

And then there’s the sky.

The sky here is expansive. It’s pervasive and the infinity of it is contagious. I think we make daydreamers here in North Dakota. We make introspective sunset-watchers. The beauty of this place isn’t in-your-face like a jungle waterfall. It is a creeper. It lulls you into a state of imagination. Turn your face up to the sky here and see the massive clouds and the palette of the day: maybe a renaissance peach and smoky blue.